My daughter's school - What they do right!

What is my view of the education system that my daughter is a part of?

I believe we as parents are responsible to give our children avenues to grow in the below 3 fields.

1.???Mental aspect

2.???Social aspect

3.???Physical aspect

Our job is to help our child find the thing that he/she likes to do and skill them to be able to lead their life around whatever they love!

I am Harsha – I am Ahana s dad. Till now Ahana used to be introduced as my daughter. Today I am Ahana s dad in this post! Wow. New experience. And SDM (My daughter’s school) also has given me a lot of new experiences that were worth mentioning and that is why I spoke the other day at their annual day. I thought I will pen down my thoughts about my views in detail on Linkedin!

From the time a child is born today, they are with their immediate family members and their mobiles! They learn a little from their family members and more from the curated world of mobile. Children today rarely get to socialize with their cousins, uncles, grandparents – they only visit! So they learn a lot from looking at what the kids in youtube videos do! And the things that they do – God alone should save our kids!

School is the first avenue of socializing for a child. And I feel that teaching language, maths, science, subjects and knowledge of things is only a small part of our child’s growth. Because today all this information is available at our fingertips and we are able to access the best quality information and content at any point. The school needs to be able to teach them the application of what they learn because that can’t be learned by watching and listening – it is possible only by “doing” and school is the only place that can give our children that experience. I have really seen that happening in Ahana’s class.

My wife used to go to the office during the lockdown and I was the work-from-home dad and that is why I have been a part of the online class every day. And I have noticed a few things that I would like to highlight.

1.???Rules of the game - There were very clear rules and communication was done constantly regarding those. Discipline is imbibed in children from an early age

2.???Focus was on the goals, not the process – The teacher rarely focussed on what to think. Mostly the path chosen was how to think. There was a lot of freedom in terms of how the child applied what was taught.

3.???Pat on the back – When somebody says well done we feel great. We still long for the likes on comments on social media. The teacher used to invariably notice and thank the child who did well.

4.???No fake praise – Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver. The giver loses credibility and the receiver gets deceived and can’t take failure anymore. I have seen the teachers are frugal with excessive praise

5.???Empathy – Most underrated skill in the world today. The teacher was able to think from the child and parents’ perspective and accordingly train on things needed

I see my daughter cry sometimes that she can’t go to school when she s unwell! And believe me, I have spoken to a lot of my friends to check if this is normal. And most are also pleasantly surprised! Imagine our childhood – Can we imagine crying to NOT go to school? Some of us are really smiling thinking of the tantrums we used to throw!

Then I understood that she enjoys the novelty at class every day, she cherishes the amazing experiences with her friends, she loves the care and concern of the teachers and the staff. She is happy to go to school than stay at home!

I feel that the school symbolizes the values that we want to imbibe in our daughter. From the top down I have seen the clarity with which they instill practices such as empathy, friendship, participation, assistance which turn out to be important in their adulthood. A school must stimulate curiosity and equip them with the confidence to face and entertain new ideas easily.

National Education Policy 2020 says that education should be more experiential, holistic, integrated, inquiry-driven, discovery-oriented, learner-centered, discussion-based, flexible, and, of course, enjoyable. Let us parents support the school to move quickly in this direction too to ensure our children get the best to develop all aspects and capabilities of learners.

In conclusion, I am happy for the growth path that the school has for my daughter and thank the management for all they are doing for society.